If I could Turn Back Time
by BrenRenQoI
Summary: A re-write of the last scene between Clark and Lois before he used the Legion ring to turn back time.


If I Could Turn Back Time

By Bren Ren

~~*S*~~

**Summary**: A re-write of the last scene between Clark and Lois before he used the Legion ring to turn back time.

**Rating**: Almost-All Audiences Approved—just a little cursing that's not quite yet allowed on primetime.

**Disclaimer**: Not mine, never will be except in my dreams…

**Author's Note**: I hate it when kisses get left on the editing room floor, so when I learned that there had been a kiss in this scene in the original script, I was a little… miffed. While I agree with the particular reason Ms. Durance gave for objecting to that kiss, that Lois Lane is "not a desperate woman," I felt that it still could have worked, not as an act of desperation, but one of determination. So here's my attempt to reclaim yet another "left on the editing room floor kiss-scene." Here's hoping you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it! And as always, I'd love to hear your thoughts on this alternate take!

~~*S*~~

If I Could Turn Back Time

By Bren Ren

~*S*~  
*_If I could turn back time  
If I could find a way  
I'd take back those words that hurt you  
And you'd stay*_

~*S*~

"No, Lois, you don't understand." Clark ventured forward a couple of small steps toward her. Closer, but still not too close. "It's because you **are** special."

"What?" Lois blinked a couple times, and with each flutter of her lids, her eyes grew wider and deadlier than twin chop-saw blades. "A load. Of **CRAP!**"

"Lois?" Clark faltered back a half-step in shock, caught completely off-guard by her razor-sharp retort. "What—

"I know bullshit when I see it raining down like a ton of anvils," Lois fairly sneered. "I aced a ten-page term paper on a thousand-word book I never even finished reading the first five pages of—and I only missed five points for spelling." She began advancing toward him once more, her steps slow and pointedly controlled. Her scarcely contained rage seethed through her voice as she pressed forward relentlessly, and the sobbing, heart-wrenched girl he'd been trying so hard to console scant moments ago vanished before his eyes with greater speed than even his own notorious disappearing acts. All too aware of the narrowing window of time he needed to use the Legion-ring to travel back before this nightmare got started, he was dumbfounded, with no clue how to respond to the sudden onslaught of the infamous wrath of Lois Lane. "I'm calling Bullshit," she finished with a mighty scowl and challenge flaring from her gaze.

Clark finally found his footing again and managed one hesitant step back toward Lois, his eyes silently pleading for her understanding. "Everyone who has ever learned the truth about me—**everyone**, Lois, has been hurt, or worse, even killed because of it. You **are** special to me, Lois," he reiterated softly. "And I… care too much about you to ever do something I know would put your life at risk."

Doubt and disbelief fairly sparkled in the new sheen of unspent tears his words wrought. "If you really care about me… how could you go right back to lying to me every day? You've been lying to me, hiding who you really are, from the day we first met." Lois broke off with a decidedly unladylike snort. "Both times," she amended with no small hint of self-derision in her tone. "You finally come clean, you're finally honest with me for the first time, and five minutes later, you want to take it all back." There was a world of anguish and longing reflecting from Clark's eyes back to hers, and they were equally certain that neither ever felt such a strong sense of hopeless despair as that which blazed between them now.

"It's not what I want, Lois," Clark told her darkly, hushed. "But I— " He broke off suddenly as he heard a distant whisper of sound, and another round of mental alarms began ringing loud inside his head as he heard a litany of approaching vehicles bearing down on the farm. Time was running out faster by the second. "I'm sorry, Lois."

Again, Clark tried to move a safe distance away to activate the ring, and again, Lois foiled him, closing in on him faster than he'd even realized she was capable of. "If I really am that special to you, Clark… you **will** tell me the truth someday, and I think you know it, because you… **we** will never have _any_ sort of real relationship, even as… friends." Lois swallowed back a bubble of fear before she could keep going. "…as long as you keep part of yourself hidden from me—especially when it's that part of you that is the **real** Clark Kent." All of the venom in her voice had quietly stolen away into the night, leaving nothing more than hushed sorrow in its wake. So soft were her next words, Clark might have missed them altogether had it not been for his enhanced hearing. "Shouldn't I have some say in the matter?" Clark's head fell to one side as his eyes crinkled with regret. "Don't you know that I am more than willing to take that risk?"

Clark's face softened with the barest hint of a smile. "I guess if there's one good thing to come of this mess, it's that I know without a doubt that you can handle the truth about me."

"It's the rest of the world gone totally berserk that's the problem," she replied almost congenially. Almost… if not for the hollow ring of desolation in her voice.

"The odds are stacked so high against us, Lois… We'd be risking everything." Despite the defeat in his voice, his words actually sparked a flicker of hope back into her eyes for a split second.

"I know," she replied somberly. "I think the past couple of days have made **that** pretty clear." Then, after screwing up her courage one last time, she reached out to rest one hand lightly atop his chest, just above his heart, and there was no mistaking the fierce pounding of his heart beneath his ribcage. "Almost as clear as the one thing I've always known deep down about you: You **are** a hero, Clark Kent."

Clark was just about to reply, but he caught the distant sound of a platoon-worth of fast-approaching footsteps hustling toward the barn. Their time had all but run out; this was the end of the line. Of this timeline, anyway.

"They're almost here," he told Lois as he turned away again. "I'm sorry, Lois," he told her again as he tried to gain some distance between them. "More than you'll ever know."

"I'm sorry, too," she replied a she continued to track his movement. A brief cat-and-mouse dance ensued for a few heartbeats until she'd backed him into a corner and right up against the wall. "I may not remember any of this when you go back, but if—**when** you finally come to your senses and tell me the truth, the whole truth, about _everything…_ you had damn well better lock this into your memory banks, because I expect you to tell me every last little detail in full Technicolor-total-recall-splendor." There was a shift in Clark's eyes, ever so brief, but the anticipation there was unmistakable. "I may not remember this, but you will." And with no further warning, she grabbed his face with both hands and pulled him down to meet her lips for a soul-searing passionate kiss, one Clark knew down to his very core that he would never forget.

It was over far too soon, almost before it had really begun, as the barn was flooded with a swarm of heavily armed men in black, primed for the fight. Clark broke away with such determination it was almost ferocious, and before Lois even had time to draw a shocked gasp, he slipped the Legion ring onto his finger and vanished in a flood of blinding light. He rematerialized in an instant, still standing in the barn, but where there had been the darkness of night shadowing every corner of the barn just moments ago, streams of bright sunlight filtered in through the slats of the wood-plank barn walls.

Clark could still feel the tingling warmth of Lois's lips on his own, and the tip of his tongue darted out to recapture the lingering taste of her, desperate as he was to sense and savor every last nuance on that far-too-brief exchange. _Yes, Lois, I will remember. Always…_ It took a good long moment for Clark to clear his head. He raked one shaky hand through his hair as he collected himself. _Now what? Right. Stop Lake's article, pick up Lois at the airport… and then I'll… figure out the "and then" then. I hope._

With a long-suffering sigh, Clark returned the ring to its hiding place with a fervent prayer to anyone listening that he wouldn't ever have to use it for something like this again. He fled the barn in a gust of rushing wind before his brain had the chance to get utterly lost recalling all the heady sensations wrought by that one little kiss from the greatest force of nature he'd ever reckoned with: Lois Lane.

~~*S*~~

Fini ~


End file.
